Morag Myserscough interviewed by John L. Walters, Eye No. 79, Spring 2011
Morag Myerscough on Type
Morag Myerscough "...notes that what used to define a graphic designer was often a flat, typographic item: 'If you did a poster that's who you were. But it's not the object or the thing, it's the understanding, knowing the nuances of the different shapes and letters and how they read or don't read. The type is the thing and that's a big part of being a graphic designer. That will go on forever'."
Towards a Visual Methodology
I've now written about 17 books as part of my research into cook books, the results can be found here. I've been thinking about my methodology for my analysis of the books - I've been trying to articulate what the design of the books are transmitting and exactly how that meaning is generated through design. It has been an interesting exercise to sit down and analyse, in a methodical manner, the language of the design of each book. I've been reading Gillian Rose's Visual Methodologies as a way of trying to consolidate my methodology as I feel I need to be able to justify the approach I've been taking. As Rose says:
"Interpreting images is just that, interpretation. As Hall suggests, it is therefore important to justify your interpretation. To do that you will need to have an explicit methodology, and this book will help you develop one. It provides a basic introduction to a range of methods that can be used to interpret visual images, and it provides enough references for you to develop more detailed methods if you need to." (1)
In the introduction Rose quotes Stuart Hall:
"It is worth remembering that there is no single or 'correct' answer to the question, 'What does this image mean?' or 'What is this ad saying?' since there is no law which can guarantee things will have 'one, true meaning', or that meanings won't change over time, work in this area is bound to be interpretative - a debate between , not who is 'right' and who is 'wrong', but between equally plausible, though sometimes competing and contesting meanings and interpretations. The best way to 'settle' such contested readings is to look again at the concrete example and try to justify one's 'reading' in detail in relation to the actual practices and forms of signification used, and what meanings they seem to be producing." (2)
What's been interesting is, that as the project has grown and I've written about more books then not only does the method that I'm using become more structured (that is, I approach each book in the same way, using the same terms, in more or less the same order) but it also becomes more self-referential. Any image is never seen in isolation but always in relation to others; unlike the first books that I wrote about, the analysis of the more recent books is, inevitably, informed by what I've learned before.
Having said that, I do feel that I've been choosing the order of the books that I'm analysing to occasionally 'throw a spanner in the works' to curb a formulaic response - for example, I wrote about Something for the Weekend, a book from a television series that I'd been given as a present, and about which I had no pre-conceived ideas, having not seen the programme. In fact, by looking closely at this book, I learned an awful lot and it was a useful and rewarding exercise. The books I have chosen are largely books that I own so, inevitably, a selection process has already happened. I am not in a position to look at every single cook book that exists and the depth at which I am analysing the titles means that, even if I did have access to all the titles, there simply would not be enough time.
I have to remind myself of the aims of this project which was to discover more about how design, and in particular, typography, creates meaning in books using cook books as a case study. At this point it is useful to think about where this research has taken me: I have looked at how brands (in the forms of authors such as Jamie Oliver) are established through the design of cook books; how the design of cook books changes as an author becomes established; how successful design formulas are used and repeated by publishers; and how cook books are now big business, their success reflected in the high production values given to them. I have been particularly interested in the paradox of massive sales of both cook books and of ready meals which I think shows how cook books are now about aspiration - they are designed for looking not cooking.
I recently went to 'Books for Cooks', a bookshop in Portobello that specialises in cook books. The shop is crammed full of cook books, arranged by types of cooking; types of food; countries etc. Seeing so many books because made me realise the limitations of my project - and, perhaps, my methodology. My decision to buy a cook books is usually based on functionality (Will I use this book?) but also on visual appeal (Is it well designed?) - as I said before, my selection has already been edited, based on my taste. I am not sure this is such a bad thing? It may not be scientific but it does mean that I am enthusiastic about what I read about - and know the subject well, having used them for reading and cooking.
Gillian Rose talks about the limitations of methodologies:
"This book offers some guidelines for investigating the meanings and effects of visual images. But the most exciting, startling and perceptive critics of visual images don't in the end depend entirely on their visual methodology, I think. They also depend on the pleasure, thrills, fascination, wonder, fear or revulsion of the person looking at the images and then writing about them. Successful interpretation depends on a passionate engagement with what you see. Use your methodology to discipline your passion, not deaden it." (1)
Rose suggests that a critical approach to visual culture:
- Takes images seriously
- Thinks about the social conditions and effects of visual objects
- Considers your own way of looking at images
"... if watching your favourite movie on a DVD for the umpteenth time at home with a group of mates is not the same as studying it for a research project; then, as Mieke Bal for one has consistently argued, it is necessary to reflect on how you as a critic of visual images are looking. As Haraway says, by thinking carefully about where we see from, 'we might become answerable for what we learn how to see'." (1)
(1) Rose, Gillian (2007) Visual Methodologies, London, Sage Publications
(2) Hall, Stuart (1997) Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, London, Routledge
Amateurist Network Logo
I was asked to design a logo for the Amateurist Network, a collective that exists 'somewhere between a support system and a learning network.' I was thinking about the idea of the amateur in design: I used the typeface Arial, a default system typeface that is considered by many professional designers to be a poor imitation of Helvetica, and based the logo's shape on A4 paper proportions, a reference to desktop publishing.
Despite the Amateurist Network's collective roots, they were keen to explore a branding and identity that could be perceived as corporate (although my early versions were rejected for being too close to the logo of American Apparel). I enjoy the tension generated by the skewed corporate Modernist logo and the egalitarian aims of the collective though, on reflection, the collective's aims and the utopian ideals of Modernism are not that far apart.
Roast Chicken and Other Stories – Simon Hopkinson
Roast Chicken and Other Stories
Simon Hopkinson with Lindsay Bareham
Published by Ebury Press, 1995 (Paperback)
Designed by Paul Bowden
Illustrations by Flo Bayley
Cover design by Rebecca Forster
This book is written by Simon Hopkinson, ‘one of Britain’s top chefs’ and a respected food writer. The design is simple, uncluttered and, on the whole, helps the reader navigate the contents. The design of the book and its relative small size, which is closer to a reference book than a cookery book, establishes the idea that this is a serious book: the over-riding effect is of understated authority generated by the use of Garamond in a formal manner. Running parallel, and in contrast, to the authority of the reference book is the idea of the book as an anthology of stories, established by the title of the book and amplified by the cover design which, with its illustration of a lemon, has more in common with the cover of a novel than a cook book.
I would argue that the design of this book suggests it can be read in two ways: the reader can choose to consult the book as a reference book, using the contents page or the index to navigate the content or, with its continuous text, it can be read as an anthology of stories, of recollections about food. It is this tension between the two functions of the book, amplified by the design, that make it such an interesting read.
Front cover
The cover is a solid vibrant blue with a dominant element of a simple illustration of a brightly-coloured lemon that contrasts against the blue; an outline illustration, barely noticeable on first glance, of a carving fork adds another level of detail to the cover. The title of the book and the author is set in lowercase sans-serif typeface, possibly Corbel, and is ranged left in the upper left-hand corner. The title of the book and the subtitle are the second most dominant element in the cover hierarchy, they are printed in two lighter blues with the author’s name in white.
The cover is simple but perfectly balanced. The lack of information and the tension between the title of the book and the seemingly non-related illustration of the lemon creates an intrigue which invites the reader to find out more. The cover acts as a taster for the ‘stories’ contained within; the format of the book, which is under sized for a cookery book, adds to the conceit that this is a story book, looking more like a novel than a cookery book.
Inside Pages
The book is 15 cm by 21 cm with black text and some full colour illustrations printed on white coated paper. The layout is based on a one-column grid with narrow inside and outside margins and symmetrical facing pages. Garamond is used throughout the book: centred titlecase bold Garamond is used for recipe titles; regular Garamond for the justified body text with bold sentence case Garamond for emphasis. Running heads are centred, set in small caps Garamond with a decorative rule beneath; pagination is centred and appears at the foot of the page.
The book is divided into sections, each dealing with a type of food, that open with a double (or occasionally single) page spread; watercolour illustrations are used on these pages to add interest and the opening pages are demarcated from the main pages by having no running heads or decorative rules. The recipes themselves are set in the same style as the ‘stories’ that precede them and are separated by the list of ingredients.
The idiosyncratic watercolour illustrations are scattered throughout the book, acting as a foil to the formality of the typography; they usually show, in a fairly representational manner, the ingredients being discussed. Section openings are announced with a larger illustration, contained in a square; these tend to be excursions into whimsy - a hake swimming in a scarf or the Eiffel tower topped with a head of garlic for example. The recipes themselves are not illustrated and I would suggest that this places the book in a lineage of books by respected food writers such as Elizabeth David and Richard Olney that have few or no illustrations. The subliminal message is that this is not a book for looking at - for idly flicking through, it is a book by a serious writer that is intended to be read.
This is not an easy book to follow whilst cooking: the type is quite small and the line length a little too long; it feels like a book which is intended for reading and not for consulting whilst cooking. The lists of ingredients are centred on the page; this works surprisingly well with the majority of ingredients being only three or four words - where the ingredient is longer, taking up the width of the page, the result is not pleasing and line breaks might have helped the reader.
There is a contents page at the front of the book which, through a controlled and simple typographical hierarchy, shows the contents of the book, breaking it down into the various sections which are shown in bold uppercase Garamond with the recipes in each section presented underneath in regular Garamond. The contents page clearly explains the structure of the book: ingredients (anchovy, asparagus, aubergine etc) arranged alphabetically with recipes focussing on each of the ingredients underneath. I feel it is worth highlighting the contents page of this book as it functions so successfully. It is clear, that when contents pages function well, they help the reader to understand and navigate, from the very start, the various parts of the book, offering a key to the structure.
Penguin Great Food Series
Penguin have just published a new series of books focussing on Great Food with 20 examples of the 'finest food writing from the last 400 years'. Like other Penguin series such as Great Ideas, Great Loves and English Journeys, these books are small paperbacks, containing sometimes edited essays often extracted from more substantial books.
The books are designed by Penguin's senior cover designer Coralie Bickford-Smith in a style relevant to the content. Lettering is by the Stephen Raw, an artist whose practice is concerned with 'language made visible'. They make a great - and collectable - series when seen all together but above are three of my favourites : A Taste of the Sun by Elizabeth David and (mainly for the titles) Everlasting Syllabub and the Art of Carving by Hannah Glasse and A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig & Other Essays by (the inappropriately named) Charles Lamb
Like the Great Ideas series, designed by David Pearson, the covers feature embossed lettering and spot varnishes to pick out the details of the illustrations. Unlike the Great Ideas series, which are typographically-based and printed in two colours, the Great Food series is far more lavish - with backgrounds based on ceramic designs relevant to the period of writing and with simple illustrations of crockery and culinary utensils that place the books firmly in the domestic sphere. The spines of the books are printed in a rainbow of colours which would look great on a bookshelf - and appeal to the collector. A further charming detail is the Penguin logo complete with knife and fork.
I'm intrigued to see what the interiors of the books are like - I'll look out for them when I visit the London Book Fair next week.
Wim Crouwel: A Graphic Odyssey – Catalogue
On the Self-Reflexive Page
At the weekend, I bought a copy of Louis Lüthi's On the Self-Reflexive Page at the Pa/per View book fair in Brussels. The subject of this modest paperback book, printed in black, is the page. All the pages in it are reproduced from other books, mainly taken from literature but also from art books that refer to literature. The extracts are arranged thematically, creating a typology of self-reflexive pages. Themes include Black Pages, Blank Pages, Drawing Pages, Photography Pages, Text Pages, Number Pages and Punctuation Pages. A list of the original sources appears in the back of the book.
Sunday Lunch Book - Extended Remix
This is the second version of the Sunday Lunch book. In this 'extended remix' hardback version, the temporal space has been stretched out over 200 pages with each page representing one minute. The pixelated image of the Sunday lunch appears on the front cover with the higher resolution image on the back cover. There are two timelines within the book: the linear progression of the book, grounded in left to right reading, that represents the three and a quarter hours that it takes to make a Sunday lunch; and the method or instructions which is based on the conventional top to bottom reading of the page in the West.
The book is 2cm thick which makes it feel fairly substantial unlike the previous pamphlet-like versions. I like the fact that the book has a physical presence: I was attempting to show the temporal space of the recipe, of something that had substance and I think the width and weight of the book illustrates this. In terms of a practical application, I'm not sure the book succeeds - although it demystifies the cooking process with precise timings and instructions, the form is not totally practical and in many ways has become a book for looking rather than cooking which was my original critique of contemporary recipe books.
The book is set in one weight and one size of Akzidenz Grotesk with italic for the footers. There is no pagination as I felt that the time at the top of the page is the pagination and any other numbering system would distract. Looking at the book now, I wonder whether the footers are needed or, perhaps they may have worked better on the horizontal. My other thought is that the book might have benefited from extra pages after the title page, before the timetable starts, just to give a breathing space...
Blurb, who printed the book, have just announced new, grey endpapers - I think these would make the book a bit smarter, linking the grey type on the cover. I might live with the book for a while and then consider printing a revised version.
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